Weekend getaway, March 2012 – Lost World of Tambun, Ipoh

Tuesday evening few minutes before midnight received text
message from one of my holiday buddies:

“Hai.. I bought Groupon
voucher for a night stay in Ipoh,
and my hubby last minute had to entertain clients to F1 this weekend. But I
still want to go..J
I know this is last minute, but if you are free and interested to join, let me
know. Leaving on Saturday.”

Without hesitate I said, “Ok,
let’s go!”J

Then I said, “Hey, we
can take ETS!”. Being one of my holiday buddies, who also enjoys train
ride, she had that in mind also. Next day when I called to book, was told
booking only available for a departure date not less than 3 days from booking
date. Otherwise, ticket must be bought at the counter. Thus, I went to KL
Sentral and bought us the tickets:

Saturday, ETS Gold KL-Ipoh _ ETD 1045 hr, ETA 1230 hr, RM35 per adult

Sunday, ETS Silver Ipoh-KL _ ETD 1400 hr, ETA 1635 hr, RM25 per adult

Saturday, 24.03.2012

Arrived at KL Sentral @ 10am. Had breakfast at a kopitiam
there. Our ETS tickets stated ‘please be
at the platform 30min before departure time’. It’s only upstairs, no hurry.
We went up 15min before departure time. As I suspected, the crowd was still at
the waiting area. We are not late at all! J

ETS Gold stops at some stations, which I couldn’t remember.
The train ride was pleasant. Arrived at Ipoh KTM station on schedule.

We lingered awhile at the station deciding whether to take
bus or taxi to Lost World of Tambun. In the meantime, I happily snapped
pictures of the train station, one of the beautiful colonial structured
building built in 1917 but completed only 18 years later. Apart from the train
station, the building also housed a once known Majestic Hotel of Ipoh, which
looked not in service any more (after we
came back to KL my friend emailed me news on its closure in March 2011).

Still, I was awed by the building structure. Apparently, the
two of us also share same interest, thus we sat awhile looking at the building
talking about a fantasy of running it ourselves! A sweet day dreaming
indeed..hehe

We have two options to go to Lost World:

Bus – take from somewhere near the Post Office next to the train
station. Look for bus to Sunway. Fare not sure, but surely minimal for a 15min
journey.

Taxi – available from the station. No meter, thus fare is
unknown.

Our check in time is 3pm, thus we decided to have our lunch
first. I can think of only one place which I went with my boyfriend and his
parents before, Mi Rebus Ramli. We asked one Polis Bantuan at the station how
best to go to Mi Rebus Ramli and then to Lost World of Tambun. He told us the
eatery was not too far, but not advisable to walk under hot sun with bags (didn’t fancy to do that
either).

He was so nice to help stopped the next taxi passed by infront
of us and told the driver where to take us for lunch, then later to Lost World.
Only when we were in the taxi it hit us to ask the driver how much the taxi
fares were. He said RM30 for us both, then later RM20 each. But we negotiated
for RM30 per taxi.

It is expensive yes, but since he waited for us and that was
my friend first visit to the eatery, we concluded that it was reasonable. I had
the normal mi rebus whilst my friend
had mi rebus special (with chicken).
The shop also serves nasi ayam, which
the taxi driver recommended. But we decided to order what the shop is famous
for, that is mi rebus. I would say it’s
a must for first timer or for those looking for famous local food. Otherwise,
it’s average.

The driver was chatty. He gave us his call card if we needed
taxi to go to train station tomorrow. Of course we didn’t plan to, but out of
courtesy I took and thanked him.

At the reception, we asked if the hotel has shuttle service from
hotel to/from town. We were told YES there is shuttle service, fee is RM5 per
pax one way. HOWEVER, the shuttle only available for 5 pax or more. Such a not-customer-oriented service offer by a
hotel which is part of the Sunway Lagoon hotel network:-P

Since I know there is a bus that passes by the area, and
such is confirmed by the staff, we decided to try the bus tomorrow.

We were given Exotic Room, but trust me, nothing is exotic
at all. Not even the paint, deco or view. Our room is facing the residential
area next to the resort, obviously nothing exotic about that. The one thing
that did satisfy me is the bathroom.

Besides breakfast the room charge included entrance to the
Hot Spring Spa. After short nap (since there’s nothing else to do), we went to
the hot spring. The Hot Spring Spa opens 6pm to 10pm whilst the water theme
park and others including Animal-Petting Zoo and boat ride at Tasik Cermin
opens 10am to 6pm (ticket is around RM40 per adult). Strategic planning indeed.

Nothing special about the Hot Spring Spa, it is as how you
can expect a hot spring is. The only different is at certain time you will get
to see a glacier. To make the visit worth, we spent a good one hour trying all available
hot spring spots.

For dinner, my good old high school friend brought us out.
He currently stays in Ipoh with his wife and 2 lovely daughters. We went to Nasi Lemak Ayam Kampung. Lots of
varieties, but I chose what the place is named after. Tasty, while price is
reasonable for a busy city.

After dinner we went to Gerbang
Malam, a daily night market. It was at a juncture of two roads. Several
Chinese eateries are seen around the area. And the unique thing is almost all
of the eateries have similarity in its name – ayam (chicken)!

I found a shop selling local snacks, tid-bits and others. The interesting part about this shop is it sells snacks that brought back many memories
during my childhood. Snacks that are not easily found nowadays (wish I took pictures). If we came to Ipoh by car, definitely I grabbed many!

Sunday, 25.03.2012

The next day my friend offered to fetch us and sent to the
train station. He came with his eldest daughter and her best friend. We had
lunch at a café there. The food spread not interesting and tasty at all, and teh tarik was lousy. The cashier’s
sarcastic comment to me that outside drink is not allowed into the café after
seeing the girls had can drinks spoilt the atmosphere more (we didn’t do it
purposely of course. The free drink was distributed outside the entrance of the
station, and the promoter opened it as she distributed to us thus left us with
no choice but to bring inside the café. We also didn’t see the notice. After
all, we bought food and drinks from the café, thus the drinks should be
exempted). Definitely won’t recommend to anyone :-P

7 comments:

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Dream Island Resort in the middle of Damdama Lake is an excellent Nature resort in Delhi NCR. This nature resort also doubles as one of the largest adventure resorts in the Delhi NCR. It is well located in Sohna Tehsil in Gurgaon District in the middle of a man made water harvesting system of Damdama lake flanked by one of the oldest mountain ranges of Aravli ranges.